Thank you for looking this up for me....instead of being cross, I am now sorry for you all for your high postage costs! Thank you Cathy for your offer, and thank you Abbeyej for the email address, I shall try that and see if it is possible to buy it as an ebook. Adnil is also very expensive, cheaper than Lulu though, about NZ$95. I love NZ but getting curriculum here.....agggghhhhhh!

Does anyone know where this can be brought as an ebook? Lulu want to charge me almost US$40 to post it to NZ (and this is the cheapest, the next level up is over US$100!!!!) This makes the book over NZ$100 (Aprox US$65) Even getting it from Aus will cost me NZ$95. This is way over my budget. I have no objection to paying for curriculum, but I do not believe the postage can possibally be that high...US$40 for one item? Can it be brought through Memoria, they have an NZ distributer, also they have sensible shipping costs. Willow.

Thank you, lots to be going on with here, I'm off to see what the library has. Willow

OK, there is Well Trained Mind, but what other Classical Education books have you enjoyed or found helpful? Willow.

We have no TV. Until January we lived in too remote an area to get it, unless we went with Sky. Now we can get it we still actually have no physical TV. We don't miss it enough to warrant spending the money. We do however watch the occasional DVD on the computer.

They found the explanations irritating. Like the previous poster they complained it added little to the information in the book. They found there was too little practice of the new concept, and although over the scope of the whole book there is heaps, we found they had forgotten most of them, because they hadn't practiced enough in the first place! A thing that REALLY irritated me was that you watch the video, then you do a whole heap of review, and only at about question 14 do you get to the new concept. Of course after doing a dozen or so other questions they have totally forgotten then new thing they have just been taught! Both of them felt the presenter was talking down to them as well. They don't feel like that about MUS or Videotext. HTH Willow.

Legos

My children are shouting "don't do it" when I read this out to them. They hated TT. We are using MUS with the youngest. The next one up, who is now at college, used Videotext. The MUS one may carry on (is on zeta) or may do VT, we are not sure yet. Do you do all the practice sheets on MUS? And all the review ones? Are you racing on before the concept has solidified? Does he explain it back to you? We found simply slowing down the best thing we ever did. For some reason I thought I was in a race. ;) I do know lots of people love TT, so hopefully someone who got on with it can give you the other side of the debate. Willow.

I think the most dangerous things with tramps is when kids go UNDER them to watch the other kids bounce above them. Fun....that is until they sit up and the bouncing kid lands on their head and breaks their neck. However, we do have a tramp, and they are NEVER EVER allowed to go under. If a ball rolls under they have to fetch an adult even if no-one is on the tramp at the time. We thought hard about the whole tramp accident thing, but then taught them how to be safe on them. My kids also climb trees, use sharp tools, go out alone to the beach (not in the water) and ride bikes in the neighbourhood. In case you think I have totally lost my mind, I live in NZ. I might worry about the "alone on the beach" thing in other countries, (or even other parts of NZ) Willow

We did an emergency take out from school of dd2, (now adult) and the rest came out soon after ("you mean, we don't HAVE to go to school? If she's not going we're not going either!" :lol:) Then we were unschooly for a bit (as in we had no idea what to do) then I read lots of books from the library including WTM. My response to WTM....fancy people doing all that, don't they have a life! :lol: So we offically unschooled. Then dd2 said, "the trouble with unschooling is that you only do things you know you will like, I think I'm missing stuff!" Then we tried Sonlight. Adored the concept, but the kids (voracious readers all) hated a lot of the readers,("too depressing") and I hated being tied to a schedule. (in those days I had not learnt how to tweek) So I started reading again. By now DD1 has grown up, and dd2 is officially homeschooling but is also in full time ballet classes. I read WTM again. I think about it a bit more. We incorporate a few more 'lessons' in our lives. Dd2 starts Apologia Biology, and LOVES it. (Loves a textbook! What is going on!) She asks for a Latin roots book to help with the biology. I buy her Vocab vine and Biology Vine. She is happy. She asks for maths, does Videotext. "This is so unfair! Why did nobody ever tell me about this before! Its so easy!" So dd is doing maths, science, Latin roots. There is no stopping this girl. She asks for French, Japanese.....we buy Rosetta Stone. Dh starts to panic, what is all this going to cost! Meanwhile I have ds coming along 6 years behind. He is, of course, unschooling. He reads, lots. He taught himself to read on Calvin and Hobbes. He has done no phonics, very little maths. So, we buy MUS, and start right at the beginning. We read SOTW aloud. He enjoys himself. DD2 goes off to College. This year DS, now 12, is doing Maths, Apologia General Science, IEW B, Getting Started with Latin, Minimus and bits of First Form Latin. Some of the Sea and Sky books from Winter promise, as he is a serious ship enthusiast, we are sort of unschooling a history/geog/world explorers with this! Handwriting (at his request) and he is asking for Ancient Greek next. No formal literature yet, but I am watching Adam Andrews "teaching the Classics, a Socratic method for Literary Education" and guess what will be next! And ds is loving it. After the last holidays (2 weeks at Easter) he said "I'm so glad to be getting back to school!" Sadly, that attitude lasted only 2 days...;) Sorry a long story, but these things often are! Willow.

Sorry, double post

We have one room for all cooking, eating and living. It is L shaped. It is also small. We have a tall bookshelf on which the HS supplies are kept. Because of lack of space this is really too close to the log fire, but we have heatproofed the side of it. Our house is tiny, (almost 900 square feet) there are 4 rooms. The kitchen/living room and 3 tiny bedrooms. The bathroom is too small for a bath and has a loo, shower and sink. We have no central heating or double glazing. We do have an outside shed with a second loo and the washing machine (no dryer) in it. (not much fun in winter!) we don't have a basement, loft or garage. I have a drawer in the kitchen area for pens, rulers etc. The kitchen dresser is used for books rather than pots (we cleared pots to the minimum as we took over more shelves with books....) Actual HS curriculum goes on the bookshelf by the fire. The kids all have bookshelves. You can put a small bookshelf on top of a chest of drawers in a childs room. Floor to celing ones can be quite narrow and fit into small gaps at the end of beds etc. Use bookcases as bedside tables. We have almost no wall space...with windows and bookshelves there is no space...but if I did have I would put up as large a world map as I could. We have a globe I keep ontop of the dresser instead. We have no TV as it would take up too much space, the computer is a laptop, and therefore compact. Baskets would be great but you have to have somewhere to store them. I am wondering about making hanging bags to hang over the kids doors with their own school stuff in them, like those bags you get for shoes in wardrobes. The kids don't have wardrobes, either build in or otherwise, no room. We have cubbies and pegs. I also use the kitchen counter for puting things to do with school during the day. This has the added advantage of making sure we clean up after breakfast before school...I'm sure if I could leave the clutter and go elsewhere I would ;)

We do it because we like it....

Apologia Swimming creatures? It is, however, Creation based, if this is a problem.

I have no idea if it is still there but there was a UK SL yahoo group and someone had done a whole year of british History done the SL way. Our Island story was the core, and Kingfisher I think.

That's OK. Glad to be of help. :001_smile:

Ds is on lesson 22 in Getting Started, and has just looked at first form. He has learnt Latin verbs are important and they come in families. The first family (or conjunction) he noticed end in 'o'. He has called them "lego" verbs...lego, legas, legat, legamus, legatis, legant :D I have no idea if the other conjuctions end in 'o' as well..... He loves Getting Started, and we are taking First Form slowly. BTW it is called "getting STARTED with latin", it is an introduction. I don't know how this would work for credits etc. I am not from the US and we don't count creditshere (and ds is not High school yet)

We find there is enough. For each lesson there are 3 practice pages. Do 1, 2 or 3, however many are needed to truly know it. Then there are 3 review pages. Each set of 3 has one major review 'lesson' but the actual questions can be anything they have done. Then there is a 'test' page where the questions can be anything and there are no 'instructions' or examples. generally we do 1 practice and 1 review, so we do 2 lessons a week. On the 5th day we do a test. But lessons have been known to take 3 weeks to master, also we have done them in a day and on rare occasions, 2 a day. (when it is a concept he has met before and knows well)

I had no vomiting, I just felt so sick and had an appalling pain (centre, above the tummy button!) I didn't realize what it was as the pain was in the 'wrong' place. The test they did was to press down above the tummy button. This did not hurt. Then they released. Then they fetched me down off the ceiling... I also had gangrene in the appendix...and still no vomiting etc.

More practice! I need it! Getting Started got me, well, started, when I was just gazing at First Form in despair (this is for me learning it not ds) but I am maybe a slow learner so I am following along in First form now. The big difference is that about 50 new things are introduced per lesson in First Form, only one at a time in Getting Started. Also Getting Started only does Latin to English translation. I need practice in both directions. So I learn things in Getting Started and then practice them in First Form. It does not follow the same scope and sequence but it seems to work for me.

Well I KNOW its not popular here but have you consider Math U See. It is so easy to actually understand maths with this programme. I think we will finish the whole lot by 11th grade so we will have time to do a more rigorous programme if he needs it. BUT I would rather he did MUS and actually understood and mastered everything there, than did an advanced academic course and retained maybe 75% of it.

We are using "getting started with Latin" by William E Linney. This is a great introduction to Latin and is secular. It introduces one new thing per lesson, when you have mastered that, on you go. A huge bonus is free online MP3 lessons/pronunciation guides. (both classical and ecclesiastical) Both i and ds 12 love 'getting started' It was the first Latin programme that I, as an adult self learner, was able to understand! I have now moved onto First Form and am on lesson 3. I am on lesson 72 of Getting Started. When ds reached lesson 20 we have introduced lesson 1 of First Form (from memoria). I expect this lesson to take about 2 weeks to do, but we will also do a lesson from 'Getting Started' daily during this time. First form is not secular but not preachy either. the first memory 'verse' is Oremus (let us pray) BTW Getting Started is one reasonabally priced book. Answers in the back and lessons free online.

AG?

My kids hated the CD's. We just used the books. (TT7, pre-algebra, geom)

We are also doing "getting started with Latin" followed up by Memorias First Form when we get to about lesson 50 or so in "getting started." We love "getting started", it is such a fun and easy start that one is hooked before one knows it. Free MP3 lessons and quizzes on the website AND only one book to buy, non consumable and answers in the back.